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I didn't learn this today but I have come to the conclusion that I really need to fix my natural POA and sight alignment with pistol.

I am heavily left eye dominant and right handed. When I naturally point the sights should look like ... |--|--|

instead they look like |-|---| and my shots go left. i move the sights into alignment but I think in the course of pulling the trigger they become naturally misaligned again.

I'm trying to develop a new natural grip with my right hand which helps but ti also puts my index finger more forward and tends to snag on the front of the trigger guard now.

I was taught to align the gun with the forearm bone. But I need to have the back strap off on an angle sort of pressing into that meaty part of my hand to get a natural POA that has the sights correctly aligned when I raise the gun. I guess I'll get used to it but not sure what else to do.

I am left eye dominant/right handed. I have found just slanting my head a bit to the right works best for me. I dont have any issues lining up the sites doing it that way

I didn't learn this today but I have come to the conclusion that I really need to fix my natural POA and sight alignment with pistol.

I am heavily left eye dominant and right handed. When I naturally point the sights should look like ... |--|--|

instead they look like |-|---| and my shots go left. i move the sights into alignment but I think in the course of pulling the trigger they become naturally misaligned again.

I'm trying to develop a new natural grip with my right hand which helps but ti also puts my index finger more forward and tends to snag on the front of the trigger guard now.

I was taught to align the gun with the forearm bone. But I need to have the back strap off on an angle sort of pressing into that meaty part of my hand to get a natural POA that has the sights correctly aligned when I raise the gun. I guess I'll get used to it but not sure what else to do.

Try this - come to a compressed ready with your muzzle slightly elevated - as you press out you should see the front sight and it should drop into the rear sight notch - your brain knows what it wants.

The pistol should be indexed under your dominant eye, and with your head square into the 'threat' your strong wrist will be slightly bent to the outside, or right if you are right handed. How much it is bent will be a result of a combiation of things - your shoulder width, and arm length are the primary drivers.

As a practical matter, your strong hand wrist is bent the same amount as your support arm wrist would be IF you weren't cross dominant. If you get what I'm saying, consider what you expect your support arm to do - I rotate my thumb forward and my fingers downward to lock up as I establish grip - somehow it works. All you are asking your strong wrist to do is what most of us ask our support wrist to do PLUS press the trigger.

Taken in that context it isn't that daunting of a task.

I would work that that press until the front sight drops into the notch. I would also refine my draw by moving my support hand contact point further to the left on my chest (assuming you are right-handed). This will result in your driving the pistol (with the muzzle down range) across your chest with the hands meeting under your dominant (left?) eye.

The reason that I would try this is because, yep you could turn your head to look out of the side of your eye orbit, BUT there are a whole bunch of experts who say that under extreme stress our eyes lock in our orbits, we get tunnel vision and so on.

Likewise NPO means different things in different situations - you need to be able to draw so your bore is located in front of your dominant eye, and the barrel is aligned along the horizontal axis from that eye.

Rep it in front of the mirror so you can get that alignment.

Other options are, as mentioned turning your head slightly - which may not be something you are able to do under survival stress; or, closing your dominant (left) eye and sighting out of your right eye, again, something you may not be able to do under extreme stress.

For your consideration.

"If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse." - Henry Ford

“You are responsible for your actions, but the world doesn’t turn around you, so it’s important that you find something bigger than yourself to work for, a way for you to make a difference.” - Drew Dix, MOH VN '68

At my last range trip last weekend, I learned very quickly that I had over-estimated my handgun skills. I printed off a drill from T.Rex arms, and proceeded to butcher the ever-living hell out of it. I also learned that as much as I love them, at speed+distance, the Trijicon HD's are hard to make hits on non-large steel targets.

Then I thought; Even though I have very little training on my RMR'd 19, I bet you at range my target will be cleaner, and before I ran out of ammo, I was wrong again.20190817_153546 by Willis, on Flickr

All this really did was make me take a long look at myself, and realize that I need to do this more, and I need to do this better. I am going to do this drill at least twice every range trip from here on in, and see if I can tighten things up.

"There is a savage beast in every man, and when you hand that man a sword or spear and send him forth to war, the beast stirs." -George R.R. Martin, A Storm of Swords

That makes a lot of sense. I don't think I have a good 'system' from holster to shot break. I also may have gotten too wrapped up in my wrist angles simply in unfounded reasons. the asking no more from the left than right makes a lot of sense. I've known or felt that I absolutely do need to index in front of that left eye if possible and I do prefer to simply stand pretty much squared up.

I'll practice this. Appreciate the visuals. Our range just had the short pistol range shut down so the shortest range is 25 yrds. So I need to get my act together. Oh and yes I am a 'north paw' and I could understand exactly what you were saying.

I can believe that about the eyes locking up. If you watch someone that thinks they may be going to drown or about to be attacked by a dog. If you find yourself in the unusual situation of looking them in the eyes at the time, they are wide eyed and dead ahead like their brain is on overdrive trying to figure which part to of the body to operate.

I have to backpedal a bit on some of the stuff I've said around here about LPVOs vs red dots. I've run drills before without noticeable issue, but did a course last night that included the VTAC 1-5, chaos, triple threat, and other multiple target drills. I've known for a while that I have bad habit of transitioning through the optic, don't know where I picked it up, but its something I had been working on. Its been a while, so I sucked at it and the LPVO only made it worse. That being said, I switched to my backup gun with EOTech and it was barely any better. I expected more of a difference, which is good because it means that the LPVO wasn't as much of a hindrance as I expected, but it did prove that they're not equal and I suck so its something that needs more work.

I have to backpedal a bit on some of the stuff I've said around here about LPVOs vs red dots. I've run drills before without noticeable issue, but did a course last night that included the VTAC 1-5, chaos, triple threat, and other multiple target drills. I've known for a while that I have bad habit of transitioning through the optic, don't know where I picked it up, but its something I had been working on. Its been a while, so I sucked at it and the LPVO only made it worse. That being said, I switched to my backup gun with EOTech and it was barely any better. I expected more of a difference, which is good because it means that the LPVO wasn't as much of a hindrance as I expected, but it did prove that they're not equal and I suck so its something that needs more work.

I caught myself doing this dry-fire 2 nights ago.
Forcing my eyes to shift to the next target and follow with the gun helped.
For me, this is instinctive with pistols, but with a rifle, I want to “live through the sight” so-to-speak.
Might not work for you, but try to force your vision to move faster than the gun- might help.

Been level, but left, for a while now with Weaver. Was thinking before I went to the range, I was going to try isosceles, just to see what happens. I'd dropped back to my trusty Ruger Mk.III, JUST so I could concentrate on the fundamentals that day.

First mag, I went Weaver. Sure enough, level, but left - even with .22's (I'm an ALL-1911-ALL-the-time-in-.45 guy otherwise, for reference). So I change to Isosceles on the next mag, and save for a flier, I'm ALL bullseyes!

And I stayed Isosceles, for the next 380 rounds. Save for a flier here & there, same result - bullseyes!

I felt like a kid in grade school again - I wanted to bring my targets home and hang them on the fridge, like a kid who's just made a an "A+" on his test!

Of course, in the short term, if Mugger T. Homeboy busts into the house, I just have to mow him down, Isosceles-style. "T.J. Hooker" always made it look AWESOME... but then... no one was ACTUALLY shooting back at the toupee, either. And I'm a damn big, inviting, target, standing Isosceles.

Clearly, when I go BACK to Weaver, I'm going to need to hold my right arm (I'm right-handed, right-eye dominant, for reference) straighter/more firmly. If anyone has any other analysis of what's going on with me, feel free to sing out. I'd BEEN shooting weaver FINE for 30 years - primarily with .45 & 10mm, but also with 9mm and .40 (but neither of those in 20 years). Just in the last 12-18 mos., I'd started drifting left. Until going Isosceles on Monday.

- Either you're part of the problem or you're part of the solution or you're just part of the landscape - Sam (Robert DeNiro) in, "Ronin" -